


Blind

by rednihilist



Category: Shame (2011)
Genre: Other, Post-Movie(s), Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-19
Updated: 2012-06-19
Packaged: 2018-06-05 13:48:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6706750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rednihilist/pseuds/rednihilist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He even gets roped into using a week's worth of sick leave after David talks it out of him that Sissy—well, that she tried to do herself in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blind

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Shame and certain characters belong to Film4, See-Saw Films, UK Film Council, et al. No profit is gained from this writing—only, hopefully, enjoyment. 
> 
> McQUEEN: Brandon is an introvert, who is imploding. Sissy is an extrovert, who is exploding.
> 
>  

 

He doesn't actually get around to it until nearly three weeks have passed by in work, running, sleeping, buying groceries, running, work, eating, meetings, running, and Sissy—a lot of Sissy, in point of fact. 

Sissy is everywhere, taking up space she has no right to and constantly dragging his attention to things it doesn't need to be on. She suffocates him merely with her presence, and yet it's when she's not there that he truly finds it hard to breathe. There's time spent at her bedside in hospital and then later proceeding carefully onto the Psych ward to sit with her in front of a TV _(and catching sight of some commercial for shampoo where a woman in the shower is repeatedly running slim fingers through long, wet hair)_. There's the moment when he's standing in the produce aisle of the market and he can't for the life of him—and, Christ, that's not a good saying to be using right now—remember if his sister likes apples or not _(and the half-remembered imagery from an art history book of swollen, red lips surrounding white teeth biting into the shiny, dripping flesh of a ripe apple)_. Who the fuck doesn't like apples? But if such a person exists, it's more than likely Sissy Sullivan. 

He finally decides to buy just one apple—yellow, because he can't stand to look at anything that red anymore, and he finds green apples utterly ridiculous. Maybe he's the one who hates apples. 

Maybe he's the one who. . . _(pulls her head back with a grip on her smooth, curling hair, just enough so her neck is a long line of exposed skin, burning to his touch, burning the life out of him for just a few moments, just long enough to actually—feel something_ _while completely num_ _b.)_

Now there's therapy looming on the horizon, and Sissy of course doesn't have health insurance or a job anymore, so he fronts the bill for the shrink himself, sets up a plan with the hospital to start paying off the expenses there as well. If there's one thing he excels at, it's paying. 

He even gets roped into using a week's worth of sick leave after David talks it out of him that Sissy—well, that she tried to do herself in. 

"Jesus, man! Why didn't you fucking say something?" He gets up quickly from his chair and strides around, only to wind up sitting down again on his desk. He's close enough that the wrinkles around his eyes are visible, and his mouth is doing a weird twitching thing that's not hard to decipher. When David reaches up and with the back of his hand rubs at his lips repeatedly _(and the laughter from his own bedroom gives way to breathy sighs and long, drawn out moans, and there are countless ways to get that kind of reaction from a woman, but the best is always to slide down with a smirk and slowly spread those pale white legs apart like opening a seam)_ , Brandon has to quickly look away and school his face into something other than disgust. 

But it's not directed at David. It's not _outward_. 

He has to hand it to the guy though. It takes him another minute or two, but he finally gathers up the courage to ask the question they both see coming a mile away. 

"Brandon, man, you don't think she– uh, did—that—because of, you know," and he grimaces while gesturing at himself, and this could go on indefinitely. He could keep David dangling from the noose for another ten minutes at least. He could. . . 

"No," Brandon says firmly, and David's face immediately takes on an expression of such pure relief _(and the moaning slides up into a wail, louder and more primal than anything he's ever heard before, and he visualizes sliding his hand over her mouth to make it stop, make it stop, make it stop)_ that he again jerks his eyes away from him. There's a moment then when Brandon has to make a decision on how far he's prepared to go with this honesty thing he'd promised himself. 

He doesn't want to be stuck anymore, trapped; he's never liked being tied down or restrained. And for all that she's messed up and completely fucked, his sister's still somehow freer than he's ever felt his entire life. 

He looks up, and David quickly turns his head to meet his eyes. Now it's concern there and pity, or maybe it's sympathy—hell, perhaps even empathy. He doesn't really know that much about the guy beyond what simply working with him and hitting the bars has told him, and there's not much sharing going on in either scenario. 

"We, uh, Sissy and I," Brandon clarifies, "we argue sometimes. Too different, I guess. It just—got bad, and she. . . " He drops his eyes down to his hands, but David is clued in enough to recognize that this isn't really the time or place—or person—to be saying this stuff. 

What was he thinking, telling shit like this to his boss in the office? People don't do this, and if they do they're always viewed as crazy and awkward. 

This is pathetic—some guy half a second away from bursting into tears in front of his boss with the whole office looking in from the other side of the glass. Even when he tries, tries so hard and just wills it to be so, he gets it wrong, fucks it up. 

"Look," David says softly, and it's strange to hear actual emotion in the guy's voice, "we can handle stuff here for awhile, ok? You should go be with– with your sister." He then leans over and sets a hand on Brandon's shoulder, and it's simultaneously so mechanical and yet honest a gesture that Brandon finds himself huffing in amusement. Right now David's making him feel like, of the two of them, Brandon's the one who's better in touch with his emotions. He's about ready to start crying, but David's almost wetting himself at having escaped any culpability in—not to mention a potential lawsuit because of— Sissy's suicide attempt. 

So Brandon clears his throat, nods, keeps his eyes on his hands.  
  
"Yeah," he agrees, and David claps him on the shoulder again before pushing off his desk and walking back around to his chair once more. Brandon stands up too, looking at David's face to get a sense of where he stands. 

"Now get out of here," David says, returning the look. He's picked up a pen and is playing around with it _(because it's obviously a woman's hand cupping that breast, sliding over it again and again, the knuckles thin and the nail beds smooth as the index finger and thumb squeeze and twist together to pinch the slowly peaking brown nipple)_ and so Brandon's more than happy to get out of there, but not fast enough to beat David's parting shot of, "And I don't want you back here until next week—at the earliest. Let's say Thursday." He waits a beat then says, not asks, "That works for you." 

Brandon is halfway out the door at that point, the right side of his body still inside, his hand curled around the cold, slickness of the doorframe. He slides his fingers downward along the painted metal before nodding that he's heard him and leaving. He stops by his desk to grab his coat and briefcase. 

He doesn't look at the computer, hasn't even turned it on since the IT guys brought it back. Every time he sees it, he wants to pick it up and hurl it across the office, maybe out the window, send it sailing downward where it will shatter on the concrete sidewalk, and no one walking past will even take notice.


End file.
